


Darkness Yearning for the Light; Light for the Darkness

by Raynidreams



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Aunt/Nephew Incest, F/M, Post-Season/Series 07 Finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2019-01-10 15:51:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12302463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raynidreams/pseuds/Raynidreams
Summary: Jon tells Daenerys about his heritage.





	Darkness Yearning for the Light; Light for the Darkness

**Author's Note:**

> Note /1  
> This is a kind of chapter 2 to the fic I posted last week where Arya sets him straight, [The Truth Can Set You Free](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12238857), but it doesn't flow exactly. I've given that story a bit of a spruce up, should anyone wish to go back and re-read.
> 
> Note /2  
> I realise the concept isn't original now but J/D wouldn't shut up talking in my head.

He knocked as before, on the tail end of a bated breath. As before, she was alone; her face inscrutable as she opened the door. That time they had merely held the other's gaze before pretence and all thoughts of the outside world had dissolved into one intense moment of connection. He’d lifted his hands to her face and guided her mouth up to his. Her hands had clawed at his back. He couldn't recall them undressing, merely that one moment his fingers had drifted over grey fur and lace and then the next, enticed warm skin into excitement.  
  
She reached for him now, her lips tilted knowingly. He took a hungry step forward, twinning her movement, but his hands came to her shoulders instead of to her neck or face. Her eyes flickered over him. Whatever she read in his expression arrested her advance and she stilled.  As she did, he brushed a thumb over the artery by her throat. Her pulse jumped.  
  
“Have they advanced? Is it imminent?” she asked. He noted how there was no hesitancy in her voice just as there was no shadow of fear in her stare. She exuded nothing but control while silently, her pulse quickened further as she waited for him to reply. He gazed at her for a long moment, trying to find the right words.  
  
“No," he replied at last. "The war council will still convene at first light."  
  
Daenerys' self-command relaxed slightly, the readiness for bad news lingering only in the firm cast to her lips. She reached fingers up to his face and gently ran them down the shape of his skull by his eye ridge, then over the plane of his cheek. He was drawn to the heat of her touch and turned to kiss her palm where it came to rest by his mouth.  
  
“Only a madman would not fear what’s coming,” she whispered, assuming the direction of his thoughts. “What’s that phrase I keep hearing? _The night is dark and full of terrors_. Well, so is the dawn when it heralds an enemy we can’t bargain with, only predict in the sense that they are coming to kill us all down to the last child.” She reached further and cupped the back of his head and brought his forehead down to hers, eye-level. “While we breathe, we still have hope, Jon.”  
  
He couldn’t ignore how she drew him. The attraction between them was as strong as the moon compelling the tide. He longed with everything in his being to kiss her in that moment and yet he reigned in on the compulsion. Instead, he nodded in agreement and added, “Every waking moment I have is consumed by thinking about what we’re up against and what it means if we lose.”  
  
She gazed intently at him before she sighed and rolled the skin of her brow against his gently, closing her eyes. They paused together that way; her breath fanning his skin, warming the chilled flesh of his face. He absorbed her closeness, counting her breaths, treasuring the strength she parcelled out, and then he raised his head, gently placing some distance between them and swallowed.  
  
“I have something to tell you.”  
  
An unreadable emotion darted across her face before she locked her expression down. He'd seen her do that before as she prepared herself for whatever dire news one of her people, or he, brought.  
  
As ready as he was ever going to be, he took a breath, “Your Grace," he said distinctly. "You know I am loyal to you. That I pledge myself and everything I am to you. I...have to tell you a truth now which _will_ change how you feel about me." He paused then nodded. "With my heart, understand that I knew nothing of this before speaking with my brother an hour ago.”  
  
If it were possible, she fixed to be yet more serene while he evidently sweated over the truth.  
  
“Ned Stark was not my father," he said quickly. "He was my uncle.” He inhaled sharply, stomach twisted up. Without diplomacy, he blurted the rest out, “I’m Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark’s legitimate son. Your brother's son.”  
  
Daenerys’ hands instantaneously jerked an inch away from his chest where they had been lingering. To Jon, that inch might as well have been a mile: their loss like the sensation of the sun suddenly shrouded out by a cloud.  
  
He raised his hands up from her body slowly and submissively, and took a step back, freeing her from his immediate physical presence. Daenerys modelled that step with one of her own. She glanced down into that space, then peered up again at him even more intently than before, her pupils probing. She didn't move any further away from him.  
  
An indeterminate time later, when she hadn't spoken or shouted for her guards, he ventured on carefully, “There’s nothing I can do to change this. Just as I can’t change what’s happened between us. _What's happening_...How I feel about you. I...” His own blood thumped hard throughout his body as the moments passed. Unreadable, Daenerys remained before him as monolithic and enigmatic as the Fist of the First Men: somewhere, there was dragonglass buried within. He clenched his jaw and lifted his chin.  “I love you,” he whispered at length.  
  
From outside, Jon heard Ghost howl as the animal sang to himself. The sound vibrated around the chamber and then clipped off on a yip.  
  
Stationary still, Daenerys observed him a little longer. Without speaking, she then retreated to the bed and sat down upon it, head held high. She pressed her hands together and precisely set them in her lap. “And your brother is positive of this?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"I know you are. It's clear. You’ve no gift for clever storytelling. You lie badly,” she said acerbic.  
  
Jon rubbed his jaw. "He wouldn't lie. He's not capable of deception."  
  
"Everyone is capable of deception. Some only of manipulation. He is Lord of Winterfell. Would he not be better served with you dead?"  
  
"Bran would never want to hurt me."  
  
"You haven't seen him for years. How do you know what he wants?"  
  
Jon didn't flinch. "He's different. Yes. But I think the truth is all he has now. Is all he is." He shook his head, his expression grief struck. He roused himself and pinned her with a look, " _When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies but the pack survives_. We stick together."  
  
"From what you say, you are no longer just a Wolf."  
  
Jon didn't try to fence with her, and not knowing what else to do, walked to a chair set opposite the bed and sat. It creaked under his weight. He spread his feet mindfully over the sweet smelling rushes, set his back straight in the chair.  
  
Daenerys tilted her head to the side watching him. "You Northerners are so strange. So reserved. Fortified."  
  
Jon did feel like breath-by-breath he was simultaneously trying to build up and tear down ramparts.  
  
"Trying to fathom you is like trying to predict the path of a storm," she concluded.  
  
He smiled fleetingly, thinking the same of her, encouraged by her shift in direction. "Thick ice hides deep, dark water. When the snow melts, that still water becomes clear." He leaned closer to her in his chair. "I intend to do nothing with this information. But it changes what's happening here." He made a gesture, pointing at the space between them. "This hasn't happened to me. It's happened to us."  
  
Daenerys pursed her mouth. In unhurried movements she stood up from the bed and bridged the gap between them but didn't touch him.  
  
"What do you want from me?" she asked him simply.  
  
Jon stood too, and then realising how close they were, moved around the chair situating it between them. Anchoring himself, he placed his hands on the backrest. "I want you to yell, to scream at me, because that's how I feel."  
  
"You want an argument?"  
  
"Arguing is honesty. It's when people stay silent, the eventual fall cuts much deeper." He willed his hand not to rise to his abdomen.  
  
"Honesty. It's your greatest virtue, isn't it, Jon?"  
  
His hands clenched around the rest at the trace of sarcasm in her tone. The urge to protect his chest increased. "It's one I try to practice." He squared his shoulders. He wanted her to allow her anger to come. She had to be angry at him. She must. Their relationship was exquisite. It was also tragically flawed. He saw that now and he needed to atone for bringing her into it. It was all his fault. "History has repeated itself. We're bound to it."  
  
"Bound to the past. Really?"  
  
He compacted his mouth and didn't reply.  
  
"For so long I wanted a family. A mother. A brother that loved me. A husband that would understand me. A child to show the world to. You mentioned the pack and the lone wolf, but likewise, from what Tyrion tells me, you are that solitary wolf. A part and yet apart."  
  
"I have a family."  
  
"Yes, you do. And I am part of it."  
  
Daenerys turned in a circle back to the bed, then faced Jon again. She proffered a hand. Jon took it, held it for a moment, then let it drop.  
  
"What should I do, your Grace?"  
  
"What should _I_ _do_ , _your_ _Grace_?" she repeated softly. Then, " _Your_ _Grace_? Don't!"    
  
Jon took a step back at the ire abruptly evident in her face.  
  
"I'm sorry."  
  
"You're sorry. Sorry. You ask me to shout, argue, but you won't argue back. Is it punishment you're asking me for?"  
  
He stood mute.  
  
"You asked me what I want. The question is: _What do you want_?"  
  
"I love you."  
  
"So you've said."  
  
"We're blood."  
  
"So it appears," she ground out. She waited him out.  
  
"I wanted you to know the truth as soon as I had... absorbed it myself."  
  
"Absorbed it. And now you've told me. Do I get time to absorb it?"  
  
"Of course. You need time."  
  
"Time. I need time." Her eyes narrowed and her voice sharpened further. "But nothing lasts, does it. Not Kings and Queens, nor castles or empires. History repeats itself." She was respiring heavily, her breasts lifting and falling noticeably beneath her gown. Jon directed his sight at her forehead. "Fine. I have time. The time until the Night King comes to Winterfell to slaughter us all." Her eyes snapped wildfire. "Just go. Now. Leave," she spat.  
  
He blinked, slightly met her eyes, his then caressed her body, before he looked away again. Guilt swamped him as did arousal. "I..." he began, before he turned and walked quietly to the door. He half twisted back before getting there. His hands helpless by his sides. "Your Grace." He bowed awkwardly. He took another step.  
  
"Don't you dare leave..." she shouted. "Don't you fucking dare!"  
  
He pulled himself to his full height. "What should I do, Dany?" he beseeched her.  
  
"You should have the courage to say what you want! If indeed, you know what you want, which I don't think you do." Having searched his face, she added, "You can't make peace with it, can you?"  
  
"I've said I love you."  
  
"And what does that mean? What do you see when you look at me?"  
  
He edged away, towards the door. Footfalls rapped sharply in his direction and then firm fingers seized his chin. She forced him to look at her.  
  
"Don't make me do this. If you want to leave, then go. But do not make me order you so you don't have to choose."  
  
"It seems wrong," he finally muttered, ashamed.  
  
She dropped his chin. Disgust there in her face. "Coward."  
  
He swore under his breath. Then groaned, his body slumped visibly.  
  
Daenerys swiftly leaned up and kissed him a quick peck upon the corner of his mouth. He turned to her lips without thinking but she was gone before they connected. He jumped back.  
  
Stalemated, she told him, "We cannot change what we are. You cannot change this. You have to make peace with it, or you're going to suffer."  
  
"What about you?"  
  
"This is about us, but you need to decide what 'us' means first."  
  
"I want you."  
  
"You also want to sabotage this."  
  
"No."  
  
"Don't you?"  
  
Daenerys had infiltrated his senses and thoughts to a degree that it was difficult to think about life without her in it. Her touch was a tonic to the madness of the world they lived in. But that world had outmanoeuvred him again and now his wanting her felt like being taken off on a recalcitrant horse, plunging him into a world of darkness, his torch blown out. He could just be her nephew, he had it within him he was sure, to love her chastely, starving out the desire. He began to say this, wanting it to be true and then stopped. She was right, he wasn't adept at lying, even to himself. It wasn't in his nature. What was, was a darkness which longed to reach for the light, as that light yearned for the darkness. He lowered his dark head to her bright one.  
  
"It bothers me," he muttered. "But I don't think it bothers me enough to stop."  
  
She pressed her lips to his briefly. "I don't feel any shame. And if I do tomorrow, it will be cognitively and misaligned. What I said before, how nothing lasts...History is the Great Wheel, a circle where people and civilisations rise and fall with the seasons. It doesn't mean that the moments we share in-between are not important. Especially now. Winter has come and it will last eternally, freezing the wheel if we do not fight for what we love."  
  
Jon hesitantly kissed her back. The kiss retained a moment of sweetness auguring the swamp of honeyed excitement that followed. A small voice in him which sounded like his father, like Ned Stark, warned him to pull back. He kissed her harder and the voice grew silent as he mindlessly surrendered to the moment. It was Daenerys that retreated this time.  
  
"If you do this, will regret break us apart?" she asked him. There was a high flush on her cheeks and her full lips were marked by his mouth. Her form against him, he searched inside for an inner voice that sounded like his own. Gradually, acceptance settled him. He knew that to exist, like a sword, become too brittle and he would shatter. Only by folding over, hardening in soft layers, would he find the right balance.  
  
"I can't lie to you. What I am feeling now, it's raw and intense." He ran one finger from her forehead, around her ear. Coming back to her shoulders, he cupped their angles. He navigated further, down her arms and took her hands. "If we win this war, we'll talk properly. Until then...I want what we have."  
  
She tugged him closer and released his hands. Daenerys encircled hers around his waist to bring his body fully flush up against hers once more. He could feel every soft curve, how she flowed around each bay and hard cape of his body. They crashed together, and only the Gods knew whether they would sink or float.  
  
She drew back then, and turned and walked towards the bed. Before it, she unclasped the front of her gown and let it fall. Removed her dragon torc. Jon stared at her face for a long moment, re-sculpturing it in his memory, ready to recall in the dark days to come.  He undid a buckle around his gambeson. Undid the laces of his trews. Slowly, he undressed piece-by-piece. Clothing in a pool by his feet, goose-flesh covering his skin, he dropped the last item of dress he held on the pile. As he walked towards her, fire glinted off the wolf's head heraldic mark on his baldric.  
  
Together, they fell onto the bed. When he sank deep into her, their eyes met. Her heat surrounded him, warming him from within and without. His last conscious thought before pleasure hit was how they would have purpose without each other, but meaning only with.


End file.
